Director of Leatherheads George Clooney serves as the angry representative for all those early pro football players, who are no doubt rolling in their graves because of how complex, rule-filled, and soft their game has become. Even if Clooney isn’t intentionally making a statement, the drastic differences between today’s bajillion-dollar NFL industry and the old game that was only slightly more organized than “smear the queer” are impossible to ignore.
The 1920s Duluth Bulldogs are a bunch of blue-collar ragtags who play a lawless game in which scoring touchdowns is a secondary goal to bloodying your opponent into submission. They play on a dirt field with empty bleachers and receive a weekly subsistence check. And they love it.
After bankruptcy threatens to cut the season short, team captain Dodge (Clooney) must find a way to keep his teammates on the field and out of the mines. The answer is war hero and heartthrob Carter Rutherford (The Office’s John Krasinski), a player with Namath’s swagger, Brady’s looks and Manning’s goody-goodiness rolled up in one. But with packed houses and sponsorship up the wazoo, Carter brings the civility of the college game to the pros.
If the costumes don’t throw you into the old days, the Randy Newman soundtrack will. Also evident once the theatricality (reminiscent of O Brother, Where Art Thou?) and boys-will-be-boys attitude is peeled away is roaring twenties hyper-capitalism at its ugliest. Good consciences are subdued by prospective gains left and right, and the get-rich schemes are glossed over with parted hair and pearly smiles. Despite the lighthearted tone, all this politicking made me question if, by the end, I liked any of the characters other than the innocent scapegoat Carter and the fun-loving gamer Dodge.
Three out of five stars
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